MULLANE: A life or death decision along Route 13

"When you're a 55-year-old, one-legged guy in a wheelchair with no home and no money, you take the weather serious."

JD Mullane @jdmullane

With a winter storm due and death a possibility in the woods of Bristol Township, Brett Worthington considered his options.

He could shelter in a church if Code Blue is called, but what if it isn’t?

He could ride the bus, but SEPTA doesn’t run all night and he’d be forced back onto the street, into the howling storm.

He could get a motel room, but had no money.

Whatever, his shelter must be sturdier than the cardboard box he calls home behind Bristol Commerce Park, a shopping center along Route 13.

“When you’re a 55-year-old, one-legged guy in a wheelchair, with no home and no money, you take the weather serious,” he said.

He squinted at a pewter sky.

“It’s coming,” he said. “I feel it.”

Rain. Wind. Snow, maybe. He was in his wheelchair on the edge of a sidewalk, on the edge of the shopping center, on the edge. On edge is how he’s lived his life, he said. It’s why he’s alone.

“My parents split when I was young, and my mother didn’t want to have anything to do with me anymore,” he said. “I left when I was 15. I was anti-social. I just couldn’t deal with people.”

Rough life after that. On and off drugs. In and out of jails and rehabs and recovery houses. Employed and unemployed, small-time jobs supervised by hard men expecting hard labor, roofing, paving, landscaping.

No girlfriends, no wife, no kids.

“No real family,” he said.

Of his seven siblings, only he and a sister survive. She’s in Virginia, the place where his right leg was amputated.

“It was a bad car accident. I moved back up here because the housing authority contacted me and said, 'Hey, we got assisted living,' and they were going to send me to Grundy Tower.

“So I moved back and it turned out the guy who was supposed to leave Grundy didn’t leave, so I ended up staying in a motel. I used up my funds while waiting. They kept telling me ‘you get next available.’ They kept putting me off. Next thing, it was the middle of January 2015.”

Again, the weather forced him to make a life or death decision.

“It was 14 degrees out, about midnight, one o’clock in the morning. I didn’t have my wheelchair. I was trying to walk, my leg was bleeding and I couldn’t walk anymore. My amputation was fresh back then.

“Walmart over there was closed but there were people who stock stuff overnight, and they were coming out for smoke breaks. I don’t have a phone, so I asked them for help, to call 911. They said they did. And nobody ever showed up. EMS, nobody.

“I waited an hour and a half. It’s freezing. My leg was bleeding. I was getting frostbitten. I was drinking — I had to numb the pain somehow. So there’s this paving stone, a pretty good size stone, laying there. And I picked it up and heaved it through Walmart’s window. Not that easy. You have to really heave it good. The whole thing shattered.

“And then — then! — they called the cops. And the cops showed up in no time. The sergeant from Bristol Borough, me and him got along well. I mean, I just told him, 'Hey, I’m freezing, I’m stuck out here.' He understood my situation.

“I knew I’d be going back to jail, but I figured I’d get two to four months. That’s better than frostbite or death out here. Now, I was a pretty wild kid. I been in trouble, robberies, this and that. And they brought all that up in court. The judge gave me two to four years, state time.”

He did two years in prison, and was out last October. No home, no money.

Social Security promised him about $800 a month, he said, but almost five months later hasn’t come through with a check. He had a room in Croydon, but the old man renting it to him grew impatient waiting for his cash, and threw him out.

“So here I am,” he said.

He considered his options.

“I’ll probably take a bus into Philly. You’d be surprised how often you find unlocked cars at a gas station. I crawl in and sleep. I know a couple of places in the city, in secluded areas.

“Well, I gotta check the bus,” he said. He swiveled his wheelchair, aiming it toward the far end of the shopping center.

“You know, I was thinking,” he said. “Of all my brothers and sisters, I’m the only one who made it past age 51. I guess that makes me a survivor. I guess it’s the only thing I’m good at, surviving.”

He rolled across the parking lot alone, toward a dollar store where the bus stops, storm clouds thickening overhead.

JD Mullane's column appears Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday. He can be reached at 215-949-5745 or at jmullane@couriertimes.com, @jdmullane.

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